How to Use a Click Track for a Cover Band: A Step-by-Step Setup Guide

More cover bands are running to click than ever before. It used to be the domain of tribute acts and function bands with full production rigs, but these days even small pub bands use a click to tighten up their sets and give the drummer a solid reference. If you've been thinking about adding one to your setup, here's how to actually do it.

Step 1: Decide Who Hears the Click

The most common approach is drummer-only click — the drummer wears one in-ear monitor or a single earpiece, follows the click, and the band follows the drummer. This is the simplest setup and requires the least equipment.

If you want the whole band locked in, everyone needs IEMs or headphones with their own mix. That's more gear but gives each player their own reference. This is worth it if your set includes backing tracks or if your band has experienced tempo drift between members.

Step 2: Set Your Tempos for Each Song

Before you can build a click track, you need to know the BPM for every song in your set. The fastest way is to use a tap tempo tool — tap along with the recording four or eight times and read the number. Once you have a BPM per song, you're ready to build.

Some bands use a single click track file per song. Others build one long file covering the entire set, with section cues marking each song. The latter is simpler to operate live — hit play once and forget it.

Step 3: Build Your Click Track File

A click track file is a WAV audio file you play back through your IEM mix. It contains the rhythmic pulse (and optionally section cues) aligned to your song's bar count. You can build one in a DAW, or use a tool like Dashplan's Click Track Builder to set BPM, drop section cues on a bar timeline, and export a WAV without touching a DAW.

Step 4: Add Section Cues

Section cues are audio announcements that fire before a key change in the arrangement — "Chorus", "Bridge", "Outro". They're hugely helpful for long sets where the band might not have rehearsed every transition recently. Drop a cue one bar early and everyone knows what's coming.

In Dashplan's Click Track Builder, you drag cues onto the bar timeline. The announcements are pre-recorded and trigger automatically in the exported WAV — no programming required.

Step 5: Deliver the Click to Your IEMs on the Night

The most common playback setup is a phone or tablet running a stereo file — click on the left channel, backing or cue audio on the right — going into your IEM transmitter. A simple Y-cable or small mixer can split the channels so the drummer hears the click and the rest of the band hears whatever else they need.

Whatever your routing, run through the full setup at rehearsal before you use it live. The first time you run to click shouldn't be at soundcheck on a Friday night.